Pakistan to Start on North-South Gas Pipe in July: Press

Pakistan, with help from Russia, will start building the Pakistan Stream Gas Pipeline, previously called the North-South Gas Pipeline, in July, according to a Bloomberg report published on December 17.

Islamabad and Moscow last month revised their 2015 deal on developing the pipeline. Under the new agreement, Pakistan will hold 74% stake in the project while Russia will have a 26% stake. Earlier, Russia was to construct the pipeline on a build, own, operate and transfer basis, passing ownership to Pakistan after 25 years. Russia was also to cover 85% of the required project expenditure whereas Pakistan only needed to provide 15%. Now, Pakistan will contribute 74% of costs, while Russia will cover 26%.

Nadeem Babar, petroleum adviser to the prime minister, told Bloomberg that Pakistan’s gas distribution companies Sui Southern Gas Co. and Sui Northern Gas Pipelines, would play a role in the project and had started acquiring land for the pipeline. Meanwhile a Russian consortium will lead construction, he said.

The 1,100-km gas pipeline will link LNG terminals near Karachi in the south of Pakistan with the city of Lahore in the north. The south Asian nation has two operational floating LNG import terminals at Port Qasim near Karachi.